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The wife of convicted con man Thomas Parenteau was sent to federal prison yesterday for fraud
that she committed in the name of love.

The fate of his mistress, however, remains unclear.

U.S. District Judge Michael H. Watson ordered Marsha Parenteau, 58, to prison for two years and
nine months for conspiring with her husband, who built luxury homes.

Sentencing for Mr. Parenteau's mistress, Pamela McCarty, 49, will continue at 1:30 p.m. today.
Watson halted that 3 p.m. hearing yesterday just after 5 p.m. when it became apparent many issues
still needed to be worked out.

The paths of the wife, who Mr. Parenteau married in 1989, and the mistress, with whom he had two
children, didn't cross in court in Columbus yesterday. But in the early 2000s, they saw each other
a lot, even living under the same roof in Dublin at one point.

Tax evasion and mortgage fraud were at the heart of the scheme that Mr. Parenteau cooked up. It
began to unravel after the Internal Revenue Service began looking into McCarty's fraudulent tax
returns in 2005. That led investigators to the mortgage fraud, which involved inflated house
prices, kickbacks and laundered proceeds.

"The gravity of your deeds ... requires a prison sentence," Watson told Mrs. Parenteau in court
after her attorney had asked for probation rather than prison. "It could all have been stopped if
Marsha had stood up and said, 'Tom, hell no!'"

Mrs. Parenteau, a registered nurse, was charged with money-laundering conspiracy for
fraudulently obtaining nearly $19 million in loans against a home at 4500 Dublin Rd., then
laundering that money.

"They say love is blind," said Assistant U.S. Attorney Richard M. Rolwing in arguing for prison
time for Mrs. Parenteau. "But Mrs. Parenteau was willfully blind to most of what she was
doing."

In an emotionless voice, Mrs. Parenteau told Watson that she was "ashamed and remorseful" for
her actions and would accept the penalties. Three grown children she had before she married
Parenteau sat in court during the hearing.

Mr. Parenteau represented himself during a long federal jury trial last year and was found
guilty July 3 of 11 charges ranging from bank fraud to witness tampering. No sentencing date has
been set for him.

McCarty was charged with money-laundering, tax and bank-fraud conspiracies for underreporting
employee income to the IRS and fraudulently obtaining millions of dollars in loans for home
purchases.

McCarty's attorney, Richard A. Cline, asked for probation or, at the most, house arrest, because
of her help with the government's case. Besides detailing the conspiracies for investigators,
McCarty wore a device to record conversations with Mr. Parenteau and testified against him in
court.

Cline also argued that McCarty was physically, sexually and psychologically abused as a child,
which led her to "fall prey" to Mr. Parenteau.

Watson said yesterday that he'll order McCarty and Mrs. Parenteau to pay restitution after the
entire amount lost by lenders has been determined.

Watson sentenced another participant in the scheme Tuesday. He sent Lance Parker, 40, to prison
for five months for conspiracy to commit bank fraud and five months for structuring, a charge
related to how he deposited his kickbacks into bank accounts. The sentences will be served
concurrently.

Parker, an electrical engineer, pleaded guilty in May 2009. Court records showed he was paid
more than $836,000 in kickbacks. U.S. attorneys asked the judge to reduce Parker's sentence because
of his "substantial assistance" in the investigation.

Parker graduated from a Westerville high school and Franklin University.

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development office of inspector general also was
involved in the Parenteau investigation.